


The Barbed Crown

by ViceHectic



Series: Vice's Whumptober2020 [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Bullying, Child Neglect, Gen, Hanging, Harassment, I needed the feels, I'm Sorry, Suicide, Whumptober, Whumptober 2020, no. 1 - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:55:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26863249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ViceHectic/pseuds/ViceHectic
Summary: Day one of Whumptober 2020 (Even if it is late)No 1. Let's hang out sometimeWaking up restrained | shackled | HANGING--There’s technically practice after school. Tobio ducks out of his class, ducks his head from members of the volleyball team, and heads home.The next day there’s “tyrant” carved into his desk.The day after there’s crowns graffitied on his previously pure white indoor shoes.The day after that one, he’s called into the faculty office during his homeroom. His math teacher tells him that just because he was replaced as the starting setter he shouldn’t be vandalizing his own stuff and threatening to tell teachers it was his former teammates’ doing.Tobio protests, denies the accusation. Tobio tells his math teacher he had no idea what tyrant even meant until a couple days ago.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime & Oikawa Tooru, Kageyama Tobio & Kitagawa Daiichi Volleyball Club, Kageyama Tobio & Oikawa Tooru, Kindaichi Yuutarou & Kunimi Akira
Series: Vice's Whumptober2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1959718
Comments: 4
Kudos: 141
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	The Barbed Crown

“Move faster! Jump higher! Match my tosses, if you want to win!”

When Kageyama Tobio stops and realizes what he’s said, looks up and sees the ice in his teammates’ eyes, his heart stops. 

And when Kageyama Tobio sets the ball up, the perfect height at the perfect speed he knows Kindaichi is capable of, there’s no one there.

“Kageyama,” the coach says, a coach he barely knows the name of, his name ends with “-to”, he’s sure. The coach doesn’t look him in the eye, “Go sit on the bench already.”

Tobio doesn’t set for the rest of the match. Kitagawa Daiichi loses the championship title after winning consecutively for nine years prior. 

Tobio doesn’t know this until he checks the news later on his phone, because Tobio rushes out after he’s benched. He grabs his bag, changes in the nearest bathroom stall, and rushes out in plain clothes, hoodie tucked over his head, head ducked as he rushes to the nearest exit of the stadium.

“My, my, my, if it isn’t ‘The King of the Court’?” 

Tobio’s mistake is stopping, whirling on his heel, his lips curled into a snarl. They’re in an empty hallway, a hallway leading to one of the back exits of the stadium with no way of entering from the outside. Everyone else is either gone or watching the exciting last match of the tournament. 

Standing behind him is a teen older than him. A teen wearing the white and turquoise uniform of a powerhouse high school. A teen that has made a name for himself. A teen that has made his school into a powerhouse high school. A teen that Tobio was a kouhai to. A teen that Tobio once respected.

“...Oikawa-san,” Tobio says, mouth dry, lips retracting into a more neutral expression.

“Yaho, Tobio-chan,” Oikawa Tooru greets, in a sweet voice with a sweet smile. But Tobio has seen those eyes before. He just saw it from his teammates a couple minutes ago. He saw it two years ago when Oikawa Tooru was his senpai. Oikawa Tooru is not the first person to look at him like that. “I would ask how you’re doing but you’ve clearly hit rock bottom. I wonder how you’ll come back from this. Beg on your hands and knees for the team to take you back as their starting setter? Swear up and down that you’ll never do it again, lying through your teeth all throughout?”

“Oikawa-san-” Tobio starts to say, but Oikawa doesn’t give him the chance.

“Let me give you a bit of advice, from senpai to kouhai, huh, Tobio-chan? After all, advice is free. I’m doing you a big favor so listen up.” Oikawa’s smile disappears and starts to speak in his regular voice, a far cry from the flighty, flippant tone he usually uses, “Don’t even think of applying to Aoba Johsai. If I see your name on the sign up sheet for the volleyball club next year, I’ll make sure the only thing you’re doing for all three years you’re there is setting up nets, gathering up stray balls, and mopping down the floors. All by yourself, got it?” Oikawa is taller than him, always has been, but only ever by a couple of centimeters ever since Tobio hit his growth spurt in his second year. But now, as Oikawa looks at him from a couple meters away in the abandoned corridor, Oikawa Tooru is like a giant over Tobio. “I won’t let you destroy another one of my teams, Tobio.”

And Oikawa turns on his heel without a second glance, whistling a carefree tune as he heads back to the cheering only faintly heard in the corridor. Like Oikawa and Tobio had just had an amiable conversation, leaving Oikawa in a good mood. Maybe, suddenly Tobio thinks, Oikawa saying his piece, tearing Tobio down, is what makes Oikawa Tooru happy. 

Tobio turns back around and sprints for the door. And he runs and runs even as his legs cry out in protest. And he runs and runs until he’s suddenly at his front door.

Tobio throws the front door closed after him, locking it with muscle memory alone, and throws himself into his bed, despite sweating like a pig. He throws himself into his bed and prays to deities he doesn’t believe in that this is all just a horrible dream.

It isn’t.

He wakes up the next day, wakes up to a message in his voicemail from his father, spending his second month in America, telling Tobio that he has to stay for another month, at least. He wakes up the next day and the moment he steps onto Kitagawa Daiichi grounds, there’s whispers. They all point and whisper, not even in hushed voices, they call him a king. 

They call him a tyrant.

He didn’t know what that meant, so instead of eating lunch he goes to the library, where the whispers follow him still, and looks up the word in the dictionary. 

He runs into the bathroom immediately after to calm his rapidly beating heart and breaths he can no longer control.

There’s technically practice after school. Tobio ducks out of his class, ducks his head from members of the volleyball team, and heads home. 

The next day there’s “tyrant” carved into his desk.

The day after there’s crowns graffitied on his previously pure white indoor shoes.

The day after that one, he’s called into the faculty office during his homeroom. His math teacher tells him that just because he was replaced as the starting setter he shouldn’t be vandalizing his own stuff and threatening to tell teachers it was his former teammates’ doing.

Tobio protests, denies the accusation. Tobio tells his math teacher he had no idea what tyrant even meant until a couple days ago. His math teacher tells him to stop his futile attempts to get some more attention. They’ve got eye-witnesses apparently.

He’s sent home for the day, suspended for a couple of days when he tells his teacher his father is at work and his mother had walked out and never came back.

The first full day Tobio is at home, he’s woken from his fitful sleep by a knock on his door.

When he opens his door there’s a halloween costume cheap gold and red crown woven with thorns that cut into his hand when he grabs it to chuck away from his front door.

The second full day Tobio is at home, he intends on stepping out of his house to pick up some more groceries. Instead, all the way from his front door and out to the sidewalk are broken shimmering gold pieces of plastic jewelry along with stomped on white flowers. 

His neighbor sees him frozen in front of the mess and she scolds him for the sight. She “supervises” as he cleans up the yard, the whole time lecturing him about appearances. 

She makes him pick up the gold, thorned, crown and carry it back inside the house as she scolds him to not leave his toys around.

Tobio doesn’t go out for groceries. 

Instead he stares at the crown sitting on the kitchen counter. There’s a mirror in the hallway between the front door and the kitchen. Tobio tries the crown on, even as its thorns dig into his head. It’s a perfect fit.

The third full day Tobio is at home, he’s received a rejection letter from Shiratorizawa and an acceptance letter from Aoba Johsai. He throws both in the trash, right with the pieces of broken jewelry and destroyed flowers.

Tobio wears the crown as soon as he wakes up, walking around the house listlessly before he makes it to the garage. Tobio hardly ever goes there, hardly ever finds the need to. But he walks around in the dimly lit room, staring at the old stuff he’s never seen his father use before. Tools, paints, pieces of wood, gardening supplies. 

Something catches Tobio’s eyes and he pulls it off the hook it’s hanging off of. He holds it in his hands, considering.

For the first time in days, Tobio moves with purpose. He digs through the hallway closet, pulls out a part of one of his old halloween costumes. He dresses in his school uniform despite not having plans to go to school. 

And he prepares.

The first day Kageyama Tobio doesn’t show up for class like he’s supposed to, there’s annoyed grumbling in the staff room. 

The second day Kageyama Tobio doesn’t show up for class like he’s supposed to, the students start to talk. They spread theories. Kageyama Tobio wasn’t suspended, he was expelled. Kageyama Tobio transferred to a different school. Kageyama Tobio is just skipping because he knows he doesn’t belong. Kageyama Tobio has offed himself, just like he deserved.

The third day Kageyama Tobio doesn’t show up for class like he’s supposed to, two staff members pull his address from his files and goes to the Kageyama household.

Ochi Hakura and Hatsumoto Ryota ring the doorbell of the house with the name plaque “Kageyama” on it, repeatedly. There’s no response for five minutes, despite banging on the door. Ochi Hakura tries to twist open the knob of the front door, just on the off chance that it is open. The door opens without so much as a creak.

Ochi Hakura and Hatsumoto Ryota exchange a look, shrug, and step into the house with a customary, “shitsurei shimasu.”

“Kageyama,” they call, poking their heads into the bare kitchen, into the hardly decorated living room. When they find nothing on the first floor, they go up to the second.

They poke into all the doors together, finding two empty bedrooms, one used as a barebones study and the other with a stripped bed, an empty bathroom, and a linen closet.

There’s only one door left at the end of the hall. 

When they open the door, with one final call of “Kageyama”, Ochi Hakura falls to her knees with a shriek. Hatsumoto Ryota is frozen on the spot. 

Kageyama Tobio is wearing a gold and red crown, like one you would find in a kid’s halloween costume. Except his crown is woven with thorns that dig into his head, making blood drip down all sides of his head. Kageyama Tobio is wearing the Kitagawa Daiichi uniform. The uniform is without creases and the tie is tied properly, fastened close to the boy’s neck. Kageyama Tobio also has a bright red cape with white fur lining around his shoulders, tied with two flimsy red strings around his neck. A faux-velvet cape that you would find in a kid’s halloween costume. Kageyama Tobio is decorated with one last thing around his neck, a brown rope. A rope that is fastened tightly around his neck. Under his feet is a tipped over chair. Kageyama Tobio’s body doesn’t move as it hangs from a beam in the ceiling.

Ochi Hakura digs her phone out of her pocket with her trembling fingers and calls the police.

The police find the white flowers and pieces of broken jewelry in the kitchen trash bin. The police question the Kageyamas’ neighbor and the housewife cries up a storm about how the boy made a mess and she had him clean up but she swears she did nothing after that.

The police call for five hours, trying to reach Kageyama Hotaru in America. The man tells them the earliest he can come back to the country is in a week. He leaves them a number that belongs to Kageyama Hotaru’s former wife. It’s a number that’s no longer in service.

The police investigate the origins of the crown, they ask the students of Kitagawa Daiichi what they know. Only two come forward, with red eyes, about what the word “King” means in context of Kageyama Tobio.

The police find the ripped up acceptance letter from Aoba Johsai. They ask the two boys about what they know about it. They exchange glances. They point him to two second years from Aoba Johsai.

When the police tell them why they’re asking for a meeting, the shorter one throws up his lunch and the taller one is frozen in place.

The taller of the two high schoolers swallows with a dry mouth after the police ask them for anything they know.

“Did Tob-, did Kageyama-kun leave a note?” he asks.

The two police detectives exchange a look. “It’s probably not the type of note you’re looking for.”

The brunet teen grits his teeth, “Please. Could you show me it?”

One of the detectives pulls out a file of the photo-copied pieces of the evidence, “It’s right on top.” The teen takes it with trembling hands, glaring at his hands like they’re betraying him.

The shorter one finally speaks, “Tooru, don’t-”

“Shut up, Hajime!” the taller one shouts, startling not only the occupants of the room but also the people trying to eavesdrop from the outside. He turns on his friend, face settled into something between a scowl and full despair, “I have to!” He turns back to the file in his hands. “I have to,” he harshly whispers.

“You don’t have to do anything, dumbass!” the shorter yells back. He reaches for the file held in his friend’s grip.

The taller pulls away, avoiding the grab, and they get into a small squabble. Before the detectives can move, the file is knocked out of the taller teen’s hand and photos and papers go flying.

“Oh god,” the shorter chokes out when the two teens are frozen, staring down.

One of the detectives reaches down to quickly pick up the papers but the damage is already done.

The two teens got a full view of Kageyama Tobio’s hanging body and Kageyama Tobio’s note written in almost illegible scrawl.

The taller runs out of the room, ignoring worried shouts after him. He runs and runs and runs.

He runs until he feels the sickness in his stomach is too much. He throws up into a bush with images burned into his head.

Kageyama Tobio, hanging, dressed like a king. And with the illegible scrawl that he had once teased Kageyama Tobio about.

_ Down with the tyrant king.  _

  
  



End file.
